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The Form of Life of Saint Clare
(1253)
Introduction
The last years of Clare’s life were characterized by her struggle to have her vision of religious life approved by the Church. In order to understand her Form of Life for the Poor Ladies, it is helpful to read those which preceded it, those of Cardinal Hugolino and Pope Innocent IV, which were based on the Benedictine Rule and the canonical legislation of the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries. Clare’s insistence on her own Form of Life no doubt came from years of attempting to live the vision Francis inspired in her within the limits of these documents, imposed as they were by men who did not comprehend the uniqueness of her vision. It is remarkable that Clare became the first woman to write a religious rule and, in so doing, inaugurated a totally new epoch for women in the life of the Church.a
Although it had been overlooked among the relics of Clare until 1893, the original document with the papal bull of Innocent IV is still preserved in the Protomonastery of Saint Clare in Assisi. The manuscript contains two phrases handwritten by the pope: “Ad instar fiat! S. [So be it!]” and “Ex causis manifestis michi et protectorii mon[asterii] fiat ad instar. [For reasons known to me and the protector of the monastery, so be it!]” The first of these is the formula of approval given by Innocent IV who uses the first letter of his baptismal name, Sinibaldo, as his signature; the second is a
- For studies on this document, see Novus Ordo, Nova Vita: Regola di santa Chiara di Assisi del 9 Agosto 1253, Text and Notes by Chiara Augusta Lianati (Matelica: Monastero Clarisse S. Maria Maddalena, 2001); Chiara di Assisi e Le Sue Fonti Legislative: Sinossi Cromatica. Federazione S. Chiara di Assisi delle Clarisse di Umbria-Sardegna (Padova: Edizioni Mesaggero Padova, 2003); Peter Van Leeuwen, “Clare’s Rule,” GR I (September 1987): 65-77; Henri de Saint-Marie, “Presence of the Benedictine Rule in the Rule of Saint Clare,” GR 6(1992): 49-65. Aidan McGraith, “Between Charism and Institution: The Approval of the Rule of Saint Clare in 1253,” GR 13 (1999): 177-202. For a general treatment of the historical context of the founding of the Poor Sisters see: Brenda Bolton, “Vitae Matrum: A Further Aspect of the Frauenfrage,” Medieval Women, ed. Derek Baker (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1978), 253-273. Hereafter, Medieval Women; Luigi Pellegrini, “Female Religious Experience and Society in Thirteenth-Century Italy,” Monks and Nuns, Saints and Outcasts: Religion in Medieval Society. Essays in Honor of Lester K. Little. Edited by Sharon Farmer and Barbara H. Rosenwein (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2000), 97-122.